Caren Mcnelly Mccormack

Category/genre: children's picture book
notable: multicultural

This book is great to read in any class to show children a look into the latino culture and one of their famous traditions. The story is about a young girl experiencing her older sisters quinceanera. The story goes through the different aspects of the tradition as the little girl is looking for someone to include her in the quinceanera. The book contains spanish words so students could not only listen about a tradition but also learn a few spanish words along the way. I would love tor read this to my second grade class.… (mer)

The Fiesta Dress is about a little girl who constantly has her family's attention on her. She absolutely loves it. But, one day everyone isn’t so focused on her because of her older sister Eva’s Quinceanera. Her aunts aren’t paying her any attention, neither is her tios, cousin and tias. She goes around trying to get everyone’s attention, but it doesn’t work. When she lets Gobi out of the laundry room, Gobi gets to her sister’s sash for her quinceanera. Then finally everyone is paying attention. She gets pampered by her sister’s helpers, feed to by her aunts and her boy cousins played with her too. Some kids always like being the center of attention because they like all eyes on them. That was how she seem at the beginning of the book. Kids especially only children like all the attention and they're used to it.… (mer)

In "The Fiesta Dress: A Quinceanera Tale," it is about a little girl named Lolo. She is always noticed by her family and when she isn't getting attention during the preparation of her older sister's quinceañera, she runs into a problem. At one point, she tries to get her dog's attention, but he ends up running out of the room he was kept in and takes the sister's sash for her outfit. Lolo's sister Eva panics and she thinks the party's ruined. Lolo then finds their dog and gets the sash back. She then explains to her family that she only wanted attention and didn't mean to let the dog out. They forgive her and thank her for thinking quickly and fixing the problem. Then, she notices that the rest of her family is noticing her again and she loves it. The party goes great and everyone, including Lolo, Eva, and their dog are happy. Overall, this book was very fun to read. Along with the author revealing some of the things they did to prepare for a quinceañera, the author also incorporated Spanish words into the story. Incorporating these Spanish words with the context of the illustrations helps build the reader's understanding and vocabulary in this language. I would definitely read this book to my students one day because it is an example of how different cultures celebrate birthdays and it provides a way to learn words from the Spanish language.… (mer)